Dumpster Dog
by Fencing Supplies
Summary: A young Naruto takes in a street dog. On their tenth year of friendship something unexpected happens. Multi-time-travel-stuff.
1. Meet

It followed me home.

I ran it a bath and discovered that it feared water.

We ate ramen together on the couch.

I called it Dumpster Dog.

Everything changed.


	2. Meat

_A/N: This is a light attempt at injecting some creativity and diversity into the well-worn time travel genre. Feel free to borrow ideas whenever you see them._

The First Year:

I stole a pair of scissors from class while the teacher was busy pulling pasta out of a girl's hair. Like a ninja; Hokage in the bag!

These huge knots as big as my fist came away! Dumpster Dog is really skinny with out his tangles now. We ate ramen together and played tag through the apartment until we fell asleep on the floor. It was one of the best days of my life.

I hardly ever go to school any more in favour of playing about the city with Dumpster Dog. We chased birds in the park and stole a necklace of sausages from a careless wife's trolley.

I got a icky stomach ache so we went home around midday. It was a funny stomach ache; it wasn't in my gut- it was on my skin.

We ate the last of the sausages together and fell asleep before sunset, exhausted from the day's excitement. I've been sleeping really well lately.

I smiled as the dog's snores broke the silence of the apartment, he's so funny!

I never want to be left alone again; I know I won't be able to stand coming home to an empty apartment after all this fun with Dumpster Dog.

Months on and I'm still skipping school; but its not like I was really learning anything there or anything. There was just too much to do and explore with Dumpster Dog.

Him and I run none-stop most mornings, through the streets and markets to the top of the Hokage Mountain.

When it starts to rain we wrestled together in the slushy mud and bask in the feel of the water after the long drought of last year.

Dumpster dug up a shiny ring and I took it to the pawn shop. I didn't think normal dogs could smell things like that- I wondered if he could smell the metal or a stench that was stuck it it.

We got twenty dollars for it and so the dog and I ate out at Ichikaru's. Now THIS is the best day ever.

I had ramen, steaming and oily. Dumpster Dog got some bread slices and old chicken- for free!

As we left the ramen chef threw Dumpster Dog a leftover cow bone and our whoops could be heard echoing as we ran home through the streets.

Home, it used to be the apartment or the house, but now it was home.

The Third Year:

The Hokage has taken to showing up in the morning and dragging me to school; he warned me that this will become a regular thing now. I felt the disapproval, but also the anger that it had taken this long for him to be told about me skipping. The Old Man held Dumpster Dog back from following me inside the school, it annoyed me, but it felt good to know I was missed, in a pathetic sort of way.

A lot of the children couldn't remember who I was and didn't realised their parent's warnings were about me. I asked a younger kid called Kiba in the playground why he was allowed his dog at school and the boy told me; because I'm an Inazuka! I told this Kiba straight out what I thought about that and the other boy laughed. We played together and I realised that we made the best of friends. Dumpster was my best friend, but this Kiba kid was now my school friend.

I've never had one of those before.

When I got out of school Dumpster Dog was waiting for me. That lonely swing was forgotten as we ran off, maybe going to school was fine, maybe time apart wouldn't be as bad as I though. Later that day Old Man Hokage showed up and took both of us off to the vet. We both got wormed and had a flea bath. Dumpster got his own collar and I got a dog care book, the first either of us had owned in our lives.

The lazy teacher which had taught me for years retired and was replaced.

I didn't know how to explain it, she was mean to everyone, but when she was in front of me, it was like only a thread was keeping her from snapping my neck. I was starting to be sent out of class and my questions overlooked. . These days, the only reason I was going to school was for the lunch time sports and my school friends.

I decided to bring my best friend to school one day for a bit of fun. Dumpster was a big dog and I rested my feet on my friend's back as he slept under the desk. Children crowded around us as they noticed Dumpster, something new and something much more interesting than the current maths lesson. Kids started to talk and point, those that were sitting close reached over to pat and scratch him. I scrunched my chubby face at them and hissed to act natural.

Stupid kids!

It ended up giving the dog's hiding spot away and both of us were pulled out of class by our ears. When I think back on it, I wasn't sure how I had smuggled the animal for that long in the first place. It was lunchtime when we got out of the office, Dumpster trotting at my heels. I realised just how happier I was walking through the hall which the scrapping of paws trailing behind me. School friends had nothing on Dumpster.

Dumpster was family.

The Hokage, as my family contact, had been told to come collect the dog and I was ordered to wait for him out the front of the school. I meet Kiba in the playgroud as he came out of his younger class, he was curious about Dumpster, saying that he smelled real strange, like a summon instead of an animal. I said that's because he hands around me, an awesome ninja, some much.

Eventually Old Man Hokage walked up a few minutes later and I could feel the interest of the children in the playground spike. My wrinkly friend called Dumpster to him and walked off steadily and composed still smoking his pipe like he owned the place... well, I think he actually does actually.

So becoming Hokage.

One of the girls called out to me in a concerned voice, "I think the Hokage just stole your dog". I laughed and used the lapse in attention to score a goal. The goalie shot me a scandalised look and crash tacked me to the ground in revenge. I wasn't worried at all, life was taken one day at a time and measured in the amount of ramen consumed.

At the end of the year, it was time for the final exam. I failed and the teacher loudly tells the others the next day that I am the dead last as the headbands are handed out and my class, the group that I've travelled through the school with for years, splits in two. The ninja's and the failures. The failures are told not to come any more and to try again next year.

With a sneer, the lady comes close to me and says that it won't do me any good. I'm a failure, and, more quietly, I'm a demon. I tell her to shut the fuck up and that thread that's been holding her back snaps; she does try to break my neck, but I'm too quick after years of pranking and run the hell out of that class room, cackling at the sight of her. I love that feeling. A seed of trouble has been planted in me.

The Fifth Year:

No one laughs at my jokes any more, they just glare and ignore me. These ones have been told- they have taken the time to believe their parents warning. Everything is icy and outlined in their young hatred. I start to skip school again, I'm sick of this; I hide from the Hokage when he starts to come again in the mornings and I spend my days outmanoeuvring the chunin trying to track me down. Dumpster Dog and I start to walk the streets and pranks are what occupy my mind these days. We spread ourselves out on the roof tops and watch dramas play out on the streets below, these sunny days start to make me content again, the company of my friend healing that hole in my chest. For a while I start to think deeply about where this life is going; where exactly?

I've chosen a dream, to be Hokage. But before it was because being the Hokage was every kids dream. Now, its different, its determined and its iron clad- and I'll show them. Rub there stinking faces in it.

The next day I'm at school early. Someone makes the mistake of name calling me. I'm not soft and fleshy any more. Know when someone back talks me its a challenge.

And I take it with both hands.

Most kids don't remember me, after all I was only their for the first week and the others didn't even have the same class as me. We are children, we forget and forgive fast. I'm an acquaintance now to those I used to know, they've grown into their brat stage anyway.

Old Man Hokage is happy about me returning and treats me to ramen, but, the Hokage asks, why did you wait until the last week of school?

I didn't have enough time to learn, the teachers don't even bother to register me in the test, hell, I don't even have time to learn my classmates' names. I don't even get the pleasure of being the picked on kid, that honour goes to some boy called Rock Lee who apparently can't even use chakra, but he still passed the test. I think about that and I deicide that when I become Hokage this Lee shall become my head ninja.

Of course, we've children, we forgive and forget fast.

The Eight Year:

Dumpster was getting old now and had been taken into the vet with a flipped stomach. I hate that I had to beg the stinkin' old pervert to stay in a town and take Dumpster to the vet. Pervy-sensei tried to explain that this sort of injury was common with old dogs and that I had to realise that my best friend was indeed getting old. This sort of injury tended to happen twice and in the second time not a lot of dogs survived and that perhaps it was time to let Dumpster go… I set him through a wall. I wasn't sure who was more surprised by that, the old perv or the receptionist; because I wasn't surprised, the second he suggested it I knew in the following heart beats some sort of pain would be inflicted.

It was just instinct to me, a friend is threatened therefore some shit needs to go down. Dumpster and I had never been apart for more than a day before, and when the vet decided to keep him over night in the animal hospital place, I wondered how it would feel. By the third day of separation I had became physically sick with headaches, vomiting and a heavy cough. It was not what I had been expecting at all.

The perv reasoned it up to being that I had just worried myself sick. But I knew better, I could feel that the sickness wasn't coming from my mind and worries, it was coming from deep in my chakra coils. For some reason, being apart from Dumpster Dog made me feel like my ribs and gut were being slowly yanked out. I visited the fox about it, but he just roared and grumbled with a "why the hell should I know?" When Dumpster was eventual allowed visitors the pain left with a snap. It was then that I started to become suspicious.

These days Dumpster wasn't going as well as he used to and I had to be aware of that, so we just walk down to the river and watch it go. Before we might have ran along its bank, raced leaves or tried to sneak up on some old ladies who were feeding the swans. But down its just quiet company that says of the unflinching loyalty we both have in eachother. We get into a lot of fights when travelling with pervy-sensie and I wonder why Dumpster has never been sliced by the wayward knife. I loved my best friend, every night after tea we both sit down on the floor together and listen to radio while the pervert darts off to the bar. We huddle together when its bed time and I falls asleep to the devoted dog's snores. But I still have my suspicions.

The Tenth Year:

It's the year of the war. Dumpster Dog stays by my side but the battles lead me places. He comes with me when I train with the toads and stays there until I know it is safe. After I defeat Pain I bring him back to Konohagakure and into the care of a civilian family. I know they need the love of my precious friend to get them through the loss of their mother to the invasion. And Dumpster needs someone to look after his old creaking bones.

Time moves and war comes, before I know it I'm ablaze with Kurama's power and in the thick of overpowered freaks as pain grips me; a familiar pain, the pain of separation. But the world needs me, and I need to grit my teeth and move on.

When it's all over I return. The family looked after him well, I thank them but they just blush and shoo me away. It's strange being a hero. Our home was destroyed, flattened by Pain. We've been given a bed in a crowded tent, it's full with clatter and noise and we love it. I'm sore, and as soon as that thought goes through my head, I smile. I'm sore from saving the world's ass, as Granny Tsunade elegantly puts it.

I wait in line like all the others in the shower block and feel content as Dumpster sulks at my feet. He never really got over his fear of water, well, its more of a hate thing now. I think this dog, he would be my most precious friend, something I had never given too much thought to before.

That starts me thinking about all those lost in the war.

Eventually a cubical's available for us and I have to drag him after me, I'm glad when I close the door just before the first tears fall.

Dumpster Dog huffs and I try to smile through the loss, he knows somehow through his doggy senses of what I'm going through. It's just something I'm going to have to adjust to - the cost of war. I attune the showers temperature and strip. Under the hot water rain I feel my muscles creak and sigh. The green and black bruises that maul my body are out in the open for the first time, they are usually hidden by my long cloths and they really are pieces of art.

I grab Dumpster by his collar and drag the dog under the water as well, his arthritis ridden joints prevent him from fighting as much as he used to. I smear his fur with shampoo lazily and start pulling the burrs I come across out, he doesn't notice much; he's too busy looking at me. I think in the beginning that it's because of the bruises or maybe even all my new scars, they glisten and cover my skin as if I had been knitted back together after going through a shredder, steadily, I realised it's not that, it's my seal.

After Kurama and I partnered up, made peace or whatever you call that strange and sudden friendship, it had changed. I realise that we have always had our baths together and of course he would notice a change like that, even if he is just a dog.

Dumpster Dog opens his jaws, "there's something I need to tell you", he says. I'm surprised, but panicking over something like this is below me now. He is my oldest friend and I trust him enough to sit still and listen.

Besides, I've always had my suspicions.


	3. Know

"Oh, so that's why I get sick!"

"Yeah, annoying, but it's the only way."

"Well, so… am I trapped than?"

"Yeah, ten years of weaving my chakra into yours, when I suck through time you're going to be wrenched along with me, regardless of how fast you can run." Naruto just hummed a forgotten tune and scratched Dumpster behind his left ear- his favourite spot.

"Could you talk all this time?"

"Yeah," Dumpsters leg started scratching the wet shower room floor. "I actually slipped up a few times, but you never seemed to hear me." Naruto stopped and the dog looked crestfallen at the loss, "I'm pretty sure my master put a seal on me that garble anything… I'd say that's probably why." He trailed off and crashed wearily down onto the floor in an old dog heap.

"Ah," Naruto pulled a shirt on; he was wearing civilian clothes a lot more these days. He just could never relax while still in that shinobi uniform, with the weight of hidden armour and the weapons pouch, the snugness of the bandage wraps and that every time you look down you flash to another memory where it was soaked a different colour. Yeah, he just can't relax like before.

This particular mundane shirt was one Pervy-sensei had got him on their travels, it said _I've survived the Tenby Valley Hot Springs _accompanied with a cartoonish and chubby looking boy soaking in a boiling barrel of soup. The pervert sage had thought it rather funny and also rather suiting for Naruto. He wasn't too keen on it, but he had to admit it was very comfy.

Naruto thought about what Dumpster Dog was telling him, "but I can hear you now because…" he swirled his hands around prompting his friend to fill the gap in information.

"Because it's been confirmed that you have mastered control over the Kyuubi and so…" Dumpster suddenly sighed and looked Naruto in the eye, a confession rushing out of the aging animal. "I didn't really pay much attention and it's been ten years, can you give me a break Naruto?" The dog did looked rather stressed out. "It's just that language was never really a strong skill of mine and it's really draining my chakra."

Naruto fell back on his butt, burying his hands in his hair and trying to _think_.

"So this countdown thing you mentioned before, how long we've got?"

Dumpster Dog barked four times, obviously more comfortable being just a dog. Not some…some time and space fabric traveling- ah, just- never mind, he'll deal with that later. Quickly, he realised in a shock, in three minutes he will be pulled away through time and disappear without a trace. What would his friends go through? What would they think? Granny Hokage, Kakashi, Sakura, Shikamaru, Sai, Choji, Konaharmaru, Kiba, everyone…_Hinata?_

Dammit he had to go say goodbye! He had to let them know what was happening! Naruto jerked up to his feet and Dumpster Dog instinctively jolted up onto his four as well.

"What are you doing?" The dog asked, worry lacing his voice.

"I need to let my friends know, I need to say goodbye!" Naruto grabbed the plastic bag of his shower stuff and lunged for the door handle. Dumpster darted between the man and the door, his lips pulled back in anticipation and fear.

"You don't need to do that! Listen, you come with me and do what you've been summoned to take care of and then I send you back to the second after the one you disappeared from, the person waiting in line for your shower room won't notice a thing so your friends aren't going to! Just settle down boy!"

Boy? Boy! What is this? This is insane- that's what this is!

"What if I don't make it back? What if something goes wrong and they have to spend the rest of their lives wondering?" Naruto steamed with dread at the idea.

Dumpster Dog calmed down as he looked at the tight face of the child he grew with. This was just Naruto being Naruto, his friend's lives before his own, even now. Dumpster dropped his head, the boy was just too tackles and selfless, sometimes it scared him.

"Trust me, Naruto, I'll get you home," _even if I have to break every bone in my body._

There was a tense stand-off, for about five heartbeats, than Naruto gave a minuscule but convicted nod; alright, I trust you. That was more than Dumpster had ever expected, because he wouldn't trust a brother who had been hiding just about everything for you. But then again, Naruto was just like that… sometimes it scared him.

They sat down with the weight of everything, not even caring about wet tiles and distant chatter of the waiting line.

"How long to go?" It was whispered in that husky voice Naruto was slowly growing into. Dumpster Dog barked three times. Three minutes.

The air was still between them, but slowly started to vibrate as Dumpster concentrated on pooling his chakra and opening a rip in time. Well… It wasn't really time travel, but Naruto was just lumping it in with that, it made his head hurt less because the truth was complex and difficult and full of long words.

"Naruto," Dumpster dog said suddenly, a warning sizzling on his black dog lips. "They're going to expect you to be a bad guy, someone who makes friends with the Kyuubi that they know, I don't think they will be able to phantom me bringing back a good guy. Just…" Dumpster sighed, not sure exactly what he was asking or wanting, just knowing that he was torn between this child; _his _child of the last ten years and the long seen master. His loyalty had been in limbo for too long and it was taking its toll. "Just be prepared to be attacked when we arrive."

Naruto nodded, his hair covered his eyes in shadow. It hung low, raggedy and free. Free to be and bask bright in its freedom, enough to burn. Burn everything, burn minds, eyes, terrors, nightmares away. Dumpster Dog had realised years ago, since the moment they meet, he idolised this child- this man. Above all else, Dumpster Dog was a _dog_, and above all else a dog's world was –noticeably- his master.

Dumpster dog needed to make a choice, he realised, as they rushed through the fabric of fabrics of the fabrics. His master, his world, his bone chewing, ear scratching, bird chasing world… or his alpha, his pack leader, his there-since-pup-days, parent, grandparents, historical partner, contracted blood sacrificed leader.

He made the decision as paws touched back to ground. Naruto. Every time.

Every damn time.


	4. No

It's ready and her heart drops, colliding with her stomach on its way down so both crash and splatter across the concert basement floor.

Every inch of the floor is covered in ink and to an untrained eye it seems like just arches, lines, running scrawl and in random places it fuses into red briefly. To the trained perspective though, this is _the_ masterpiece, you can see the months of labour and the generations of knowledge that was poured into this, the fundamental parts are done in blood so that it is sure, sure they will work, sure that they will be potent, sure the skeleton and core structure will not buckle, sure the arrow is poised in the bow. They quiver with power even though, right now, all they are is ink and blood spread across the life sucking cold concrete.

A nod to him, a spread of her hands onto the deadly design, a sign and a countdown, a poof and the shaggy dog is gone.

His mission is to find this monster who the summons prophesised about, the one whose power will stop this war if all goes right. If things don't go right though… she tries to reassure herself against it as she pumps all her chakra, all her energy, all her life, into the array.

But, there is a reason that this is being done in secret, nations away from the Fire Country. It's so that if the monster breaks free, at least there will be villages and kilometres and even a peninsula between the uncontrollable monster and home. That is the down side to risking everything, if everything goes wrong, you've got nothing, because you've already given up back there and nothing more remains.

Everything leaves you with nothing. That's what she fears most.

The seals are humming and surge. Kakashi, the only other one with her, cracks a handful of smoke bombs against the walls so that when the monster arrives back in heartbeats, there will not be time for recognition or realisation. (The summon chief's warned them, this monster is an alternative, from a place running alongside theirs. What happens if the monster is someone they know, or love, or themselves?) As much as the smoke is there to stop the monster, which has the servitude and more power than that of the Kyuubi, it is there to stop themselves from hesitating in that one vital moment. Because, what if it all goes wrong?

You've got nothing left then. That's what she fears most, if she can't stress enough. In this crucial moment of war, fear froths over and distorts more than usual- it comes at you.

All these thoughts were in two heart beats, she is trembling and spewing as still she forces everything into the mosaic across the floor. There is a slurp as the dog slips back from wherever it went for those seconds that weren't even long enough to manage a word. She grieves for the dog, because for them it's a single breath, for the dog though, it could be thousands or millions. Watching and waiting until the human becomes the monster and how long could that be? No; how long was it?

She hears the rush of her seals, of the dogs claws scraping the ground. She also hears the shout from the ceiling.

Silly monster…why would she be content with just the floor? Everything is tattooed and stained in her work, the walls, the ceiling, her and Kakashi's bodies if he attacks.

She smirks, this is a rare time she actual through ahead and timed her moves. There is no way she is losing this one.

* * *

The only reasons Naruto knew the shift had occurred at all was that of the cold shower floor leaving and the smoke of the next world billowing against his face. The place in which stands people, intent on harvesting his power for their war, their other time and their realm of bumps and grumps and slips and dips. He knows because he is a sage, he is _The Toad Sage_, he has felt the silk of the world and he can instantly feel the familiarity yet the strangeness in this next one.

Before his feet touch the floor he know this place is crawling in seals, all so huge and powerful…loaded fuller then any cannon and pointed directly for him. If he had been a lesser shinobi by a fraction, he would have been ensnared and tangled faster and better than the spider does to the struggling fly on its web. He would have dropped, covered in everything which seals can tangle you in- which is a lot, all the elements, all the feelings, all the energies. It was such a magnificent trap, that if not for Dumpster Dog's warning he would have certainty fallen. Had Dumpster meant to do that?

And if he had been captured, it would have left the two tightly wound and vast chakra signatures in the room to cheer. For a mission well done, for a war now won and for the release of the breathe they were holding in a whoosh- they had just successfully immobilized the most powerful creature to exist and it is now wrapped to do their wills until they give the when.

Unfortunately for them he is not a "lesser shinobi by a fraction" he is the great peace that smothered the nations. The peace is not a thing, it is a person and it is him whose name is being whispered around the Nation's council meetings, through the tea shops and across the rice pools.

This boy, who wears civilian clothes and chooses to live anonymously in the tent city of a re-building Konoha, he is peace and he is power.

And he is not liking the idea of being lathered in tags and seals. His power was not going to simply fall neatly into the wrong hands. Anyway, the scrawny teenager side of himself concurred with the new sensible voice in his head, the one forced into existence by the power and responsibility that has been flung at him in the last few months, well, nearly a year now.

There was no way he, Naruto Uzumaki, was fine with just "going along with it". Stupid adults had been ordering him around the moment he got back from the war, like he needed to be controlled or disciplined for having amassed command on the uncontrollable and chaotic frontline. "It will go to his head" they say "he'll become arrogant" they say.

These people, he shall meet them with a big fat teenage rebellion laced…

"Better luck next time, _assholes_!"

He smirks, this is a rare time he actual through ahead and timed his moves. There is no way he is losing this one.

Wait…what? It's Kakashi. What's he doing? And its…it's her. His mother. He feels the seals from the roof start to snake into his chakra, this time hes too ...too confused and surprised... he forgets fight. Why is Kakashi a bad guy, why is his Mother alive? Suddenly, for a stupid minute Naruto trusts these people completely, they could be conspiring to kill him but there is so much trust for his thems that it flows over to these thems.

He's successfully chained and sealed into a controlled coma. The eerie hum and clank of his mindscape greets him. _Think Naruto_, he prompts himself as he sits up, warm water running off him. _Dumpster wouldn't put you in danger, he wouldn't- he couldn't_. Naruto is careful to be quite and still as Karama sleeps in front of him. He does not want to wake the demon, after all, he had promised that he wouldn't trouble Karama until he was fully healed from his effort in the war.

It had been Naruto's idea. Kurama had nearly permanently crippled himself, and Naruto was not having that on his conscious. Kurama was a sudden friend, but a good friend. The beast had fallen into hibernation in trust that Naruto would keep him safe while he regenerated. Naruto keeps his promises.

These people were not getting anything from _his_ demon. He was kicking himself now, feeling foolish for the rush of trust before. He did not know them; Dumpster may be working against his will for them. Why would they want power so desperately that they were willing to cross worlds for it?

Naruto did not know. Naruto was going to find out. Naruto was slowly rising fully, with water steaming off the edges of his civilian's shirt, the happy tourist picture on morphed and disgusting in the seriousness of danger.

The water at his feet starts to steam and boil.

Sometimes in the dead of night, Naruto thinks that in some aspects, he is more powerful than Karama could ever be.

This was his mindscape.

He is the creator.

And he demands out.

* * *

Kushina felt her own seal churn and writhe in her now empty chakra system. The Kyuubi was unsettled by the amount of power she had sapped from it to rig all the seals. Seals that had to be strong enough to hold all of a replica nine tail's wrath.

She hoped the strain was enough for the beast to die; if that was possible. Then maybe she could be free of it. Free of the looks and of the duty. She was a weapon of the village, sharp and deadly. They are at war, long and deathly.

The target dropped from the roof like a wavering spider hit with an on-contact pesticide. The dog whined as the limp boy hit the group with a crunch. Dear god, the dog had aged. Before it was just young out of puppy-hood, raised all its short life with this mission in mind. It was eager and bright eyed then with the excitement of serving its master proud. Now it just looked old and grey.

She regarded the blonde from her place, heaving with effort, on the floor. This was a person who is so vile that he gets along with the Kyuubi. That they both have absolute trust and respect in each other. It's sickening, she hates this person.

Kakashi goes over to the dog. The sacrificial lamb of the entire operation. She hadn't even bothered to ask for its name before it was sucked away. What must it have gone through, having to find and stay close to a person like the blonde? What horrors must it have seen, what death and rotting decay?

They need to work. The sooner they harness the blonde's power, the sooner they obliterate this generations-old war, the sooner they finish up and kill this ally to the devil, the sooner she can go home.

The sooner she can have a cramped little apartment of her own, a favourite eating spot down the street, take up a normal job and just enjoy for the first time, waking up to _no _screaming, sobbing or worrying dead silence.

"Thorneywood Terror." She hears Kakashi say has he reunites with a dog he saw not even a minute ago, but really, it must be over a decade for the loyal summon. "You did us proud."

The pup she knew before would have wiggled in happiness and jumped up onto Kakashi. But this old one, he just looks away sadly, folds of skin hanging in age and testimony of the time spent. Wasted, she thinks.

Then Thorneywood does something unexpected. He hobbles on his creaking legs and goes over to the blonde target. Maybe it's to marvel at a monster finally trapped. Kakashi helps her up and they both use each other for support as they hobble over as well, to the silent, barely breathing body.

It's not what she through, because the dog huffs in sorrow and collapses down, lying with its head on the body's chest and staring into the thing's motionless, slack face.

They come closer and she sees the target fully. And she is struck. With how young, how healthy, now open and innocent and carefree this boy looks. She did not expect this. Her own stress lines that have appeared well before their time pull tight. They share a demon in common, she and him. Except he seems to have befriended and dealt and thrived; while she, well she…she just survives.

Just survives.

* * *

Naruto jolts himself awake out of pure stubbornness. His eyes fly own and the first thing he sees is Kakashi. Then his Mother. No. No they aren't, they could have different names and different personalities, scratch that, they aren't just "could" be different, they diffidently are.

He sees their faces crunch into sudden shock, then horror. But they can't do anything, because he's up and their exhausted. He hears Dumpster Dog woof softly from his feet and Naruto snaps his head down.

"Hey buddy," he says quietly. Naruto crouches down to the dog, taking his floppy ears and affectionately ruffing the dog's fur and fat rolls around. Slowly, without moving from his crouch at dog height, he raises his eyes up to meet the people. Both leaning on each other for support. He has resolved to talk to them;

So he tells them, that "just to let you know, but… look, Kurama just isn't healthy enough to offer you any power." He says it straight, he drives the point. To avoid a jabber of questions and disagreements. He watches they start, at what? That the great Kyuubi is out of fuel? That he refers to it by name? Of course he does, they summoned him _because_ he had harmonised with he Kyuubi.

His Mother's mouth is opening and closing silently, like a stunned fish. He looks at her closely, and forces himself to see the differences. This one is crueller, in every way. In how her hair is pulled back in a hurried mess and how her shinobi gear sits exposed and coated in dried, flaking blood. But as he scrutinises, the similarities come out. In that, again her hair, it's the same shade and has tumbled out of its restraints, loose and long. How her eyes just watch, with horror but also, under it all, the ever present "give it your best shot" taut that he noticed when he meet his actual Mother. One, people say, which swims in his own eyes.

There is a quiet wheeze from Dumpster that only he can hear.

"Help 'em." He looks at the dogs pleading face, and back to the people. He watches Kakashi and realises he must he Dumpster's master, or at least his summoner.

"Your dog trusts me. If you trust me enough to take off these seals then I can help you out." These seals, they were making it hard to breath and move right now.

Kakashi coughs.

"As long as no one gets hurt, and you help, and you don't do anything funny." He starts to shuffle towards Naruto, Kushina standing behind eyeing his up and down, watching for any signs of aggression, flaws or reasons to not trust.

Just as Kakashi reaches Naruto's side, he suddenly jerks and with a twirl tries to drive a kunai into Naruto's side. Naruto's too quick for that through, too prepared because Kakashi would never do something like this one had before and trust blindly. Naruto flicks his hand out and easily prises it from Kakashi, who is so weak right now, so tried and spent that the effort to lunge his arm around as fast as he did sends him crashing to the floor.

Naruto feels better now with a weapon. Because he was back on duty, and the light pockets and lack of armour was sending chills down is spine every few moments. He had to talk sense to them, well, her now, because Kakashi had just passed out.

Reasoning was never something he considered a strong point, but he had talked many to changed philosophies across the battle field. Too many fights, he thinks. Too many battle fields and too many lost people.

But he needs to talk these ones sense. He_ needs _to talk sense into them_._

"Listen, we are all sapped dead, and if you continue to push this into a fight instead of talking it out, than whoever has got Dumpster's loyalty will be the one to win, because he's the only one capable of fighting anything worth shit." Naruto narrows his eyes and jabs his thumb violently to his chest. "And right now, the one with his loyalty is me." He watches his mother, Kushina he should really say, jolt her head up in sudden viciousness.

"Ha! You think that? It's all been a scam kid; he's just been pretending to like you to get close." Inside, for a moment, Naruto goes cold in instinctive doubt. Because what? Maybe? Perhaps? He is always been extremely sensitive when it comes to friends. Because he _needs_ them.

No, not Dumpster Dog, he can trust this bumbling single minded animal. With not his life, but with something more precious than that, a life of another.

He remembers when Lee had been in hospital, spine crushed and facing a changed future.

_"Lee, this is Dumpster, my dog." _

_"Whoa, Naruto, I didn't know you had a pet!"_

_ "Hey! He's not a pet, he's family!" _

_"He sure does shine with youth!"_

_ "He's just excited to be here, he loves meeting new people." _

_"I've never really meet a dog before, he's furs softer than I thought." _

_"That's just because I take such awesome care of him!" "Excellent Naruto, you keep this dog healthy in its spring time of youth!" _

_"Lee, I need to ask, but, I'm going away with Pervy-sage and I need someone to look after him for a few weeks-" _

_"Of course Naruto! It's my honour to take care of someone that is precious to you!" _

_"Good! Good then! That really good!"_

Lee though he was looking after Dumpster Dog, but in reality, the dog was looking after him.

He watches Kushina smirk in defiance, and his mouth twisted to mirror her look purposefully.

"Oh, well then, violence it is." He snapped out and grabbed a fistful of her hair, pulling it enough to make her break her iron mask and wince. He didn't want to hurt her, but she needed to believe she was really going to die if he was to get these seals off. He brought Kakashi's kunai against her throat.

"Listen, I'm not the one who's going to die if these seals don't come off soon, so you better make a decision." She just swore at him.

He didn't take into account her nerve.

She would rather waste her own life, he realised, than risk everyone else's by unsealing him. He knew, he was the same. What would work on him than? Someone close. Looking at the age of Kakashi, who was collapsed and unconscious with exhaustion on the ground, there might be a young Naruto in this world. But there might not be. He turned back to her, getting ready to bluff big time.

"You may have caught me, but the Kyuubi managed to split. A handy little trick." He tried to make it believable; after all, they didn't know what sort of powers a harmonised pair of demon and container held. "He's got his claws around a certain someone's throat, so if you don't remove these seals now, I'm going to give the word and their going to go…" He pushed the blade deeper into her neck, letting a trail of blood form and trickle down her neck. "..snap…" he finished praying to god it works.

She was scared, not sure if the risk was worth it, if it really was true. All he needed was some uncanny fact and this would work…he just needed to take a risk here… his Mother is glancing at Kakashi, watching for any signs that he might be fooling.

"He doesn't suspect a thing yet, he doesn't realise that his pretty blonde head is one word away from decapitation." He adds one dry chuckle which feels wrong and sick on his tongue. He is trying to channel all the evil monologues he had to wait and listen to. "Foolish, foolish Na-" _Naruto_…

"Okay, okay! Just leave him alone okay?" There are tears streaming in currents down her cheeks and onto the floor, some continue to slide over her jaw and down her neck. Under her hacking breath he hears her whisper, "Damn you Minato, look after yourself for a change."

He feels his heart skip; that was a close one. He feels Dumpster Dog sit at his heels and takes his first breathe in what seems like ages that doesn't shoot him full of pain.

She is slowly pulling the seals off, blubbering all the while like a Mother whale over a dead calf.

As the last seal vanishes, he puts his hand on her shoulder. She flinches, after all, her neck is still bleeding thick and black from where he had sliced her. He wonders if telling her will be classified as cruel or kind. Well, whatever.

"I was just joking you know." And then he cracks out his ear to ear grin for the first time. "You wouldn't have trusted me any other way, sorry about that!" He scratches the back of his head sheepishly and pats her in excitement because he can breathe now. "I'm Naruto, Imagoodguy!" He trips over his words with happiness, because he's _free,_ and in another _world_, how cool, and look, it's his _Mother_!


	5. Aloud

Naruto left after she screamed and tried to kill him. He had gently laid their sleeping bodies out, both passed out with exhaustion.

The summoning had taken it out of everyone, he suspected that the only reason he was still functioning semi normally was because his body was familiar with the horrible dry feeling. He knows; when the Kyuubi used to pump him full of demon power and then cruelly lift away in an instant. He knows.

Naruto started to walk towards the tight dug out stairs he could see in the far corner of the room, rubbing his nose against his sleeve as he walked unsteadily. He was busy imagining all the mysteries and adventures that could be waiting up on the surface, all that was to have in this new world.

Perhaps they had invented a different flavour of ramen here?

Those thoughts were cuts through when he registered the clinking and scrapping of Dumpster's claws as the dog obediently followed behind him. He was not used to having the dog when he was in shinobi mode, he had completely forgotten for a minute there. Could the dog take care of himself? Sure Dumpster had remain safe when they both travelled with Jariya, but the level of fighting that he got involved in now was lifetimes above what it used to be. He flipped the key to his locker, which he had found in his pants pocket just before. Twirling it around in the air, absent minded to what he was doing.

Was he strong enough these days, to fight threats and protect at the same time.

Naruto likes risks, but he does not like this one.

Dumpster is sitting, watching the cheap key jump up and down in Naruto's hand. He's busy tensing up, waiting to see if he'll through it and tell him to fetch. He is really hoping he will, because he really likes playing fetch, especially with Naruto. Naruto freezes and bends back down to Dumpster's level.

"Dumpster, how do we get home?" He realises that he needs to switch his dog brain off, and turn his summon brain on. It's hard work, and takes a lot of concentration. He's already weak from the explaining he had to do before and the realm travel.

"Can't until the keeper lets you go." His words are slurred with sleeplessness. Naruto leans his head to one side, raising an eye brow and waiting with extraordinary patience, considering this is Naruto, for further explanation.

But Dumpster Dog just can't right now. He yawns wide; so much so that he feels his lips pull tight, letting his tongue curl back, he hopes the message of 'not strong enough to explain right now' gets through to the master. He starts to let his eyelids close in heavy, welcoming sleep.

There is this finger, poking him in the chest. Master doesn't not get the message, so he musters up his last ounce of strength and strings together a sentence.

"Not 'ough left to explain…" With that he lets his legs dive out and drops to the floor, letting out a sigh in pleasure as the weight stain leaves his rotten muscles.

He's just…almost…just there, on the fuzzy edge of calm sleep when strong, warm hands worm under him and lift him up. Arms rest him against a solid chest and Dumpster Dog has a flash of pride, that his alpha is so strong and kind; let all the other dogs knock their ears in envy!

It smells like his master, it probably –diffidently is his master, so he doesn't bother to open his eyes and check. Sleep comes a lot quicker and the world just seems a lot better, Dumpster thinks, when you know your Alpha is protecting you.

The donk, donk, donk as Naruto climbs the spiralling, cramped stairs lulls Dumpster off to sleep. Finally.

Naruto walks as smoothly as possible up the sliding, rocky slope. The exit had been down in the bottom of a deep crater, and right now he was just nearing the top, getting his first glimpse of sort of country he was in.

He watched the wind brush its fingers through the grassland which stretches in to the horizon unbroken. It looked like Grass country to him. Picking a direction, he starts to wade into the waist high grass, hyper alert for any guards that may have been stationed outside the tunnel he had been summoned into.

He was starting to wonder if leaving the two weak ninja alone in this deserted place was a good idea. They could look after themselves right? Even in the state they were in?

Of course they could. Who was he kidding, they were safe and hidden down there and he had seen traveling packs full of food and water by the stairs. They would be fine.

Now he needed to concentrate on hiding him and Dumpster for safety until the animal gained enough strength to tell him how to get home.

The grass swished and reaches out to him like he had wondered accidently onto a dance floor full of overly happy drunks. He saw a few crows fly over the endless field and turned to go in the direction that they were flying, hoping that they would lead him to something.

It was when the shadows were long and witchy that Dumpster finally opened his eyes. He had been shifting and twitching every hour and then as Naruto walked, but this was the first time he had fully woken up and not fallen back to sleep. Naruto stopped and sat down, the grass swallowing and digesting them whole.

"So…which way home?" Naruto lay out on his back and watched the clouds fly through the sky, feeling strangely happy and calm. Maybe it was in the way that the wind makes the grass rustle and sound like a giants sleeping breathes. Maybe it was that he knew that he was strong enough that dying out here was impossible. Maybe it was just the presence of Dumpster Dog. Maybe it was because he was still on a high after meeting his mother again.

"Are, tricky, tricky." The dog tittered and shuffled in shame. Sitting beside Naruto and resting its head on his cheat, like he likes to do. The dog stretched himself out and released a long breath. Naruto suspected that, it too, was watching the clouds whip past on jet stream winds.

"Just try your best to explain it."

"Well, when you come through the fabric, you got locked into a contract." The old dog thinks about his words. "And I can't carry you back through the fabric again until the contract is broken." There is silence and Naruto wants to ask so many questions all at once, but he waits. He needs to give the dog time to construct his sentences and remember his punctuation. It's okay, he feels like he's got all the time in the world to listen, as he lies in the grass.

"Dumpster," Naruto starts, a thought to mind. "Will I look older when I go back home?"

"No, same moment, same body. There's not going to be a difference." Well, then Naruto really does have time to waste. He could live a lifetime out here, and go back just the same.

"There is a contractor; he is the only one who can break the contract. He was the one that your power was going to be channelled to." Naruto lifts his head and eyes the dog, telling him to go on.

"It's the Third Hokage, that's all I know, you just need to convince him and then he can break it mentally. It was a failsafe that they drew in, in case your power needed to be broke off…you know, in case it was corrupting him or something when he started to accept it into his system."

It was nagging him; he needed to ask the dog.

"Would I have died if they managed to pull my power out like that?" Dumpster sat up to look him in the eye.

"They designed with the purpose to kill you."

Oh.

"So find the Hokage, get him to understand and then we can head back home." The dog ordered him, signalling that he had had enough of talking to last him decades.

"But weren't you born here? Isn't this your home?" Dumpster Dog gave him a jagged look, as if he was scandalised that Naruto had suggested that his home was anywhere but besides Naruto.

Oh.

"I hate talking." Dumpster muttered, getting to his feet. Naruto followed suit.

"Are you alright to walk?" Naruto asked worriedly, remembering he was dealing with a senior.

"I'm fine, I'm fine." Dumpster said, like an old man waving off an overbearing nurse.

So they set out, Naruto parting the grass ocean and Dumpster following in his footsteps.

They came to a barn seven hours after nightfall, both collapsed into the straw filled loft and sleep like the dead, with only the sounds of humming insects, whistling night birds and the cows outside chewing and ripping at the grass.

* * *

"Oh dear, Naruto, did you realise the implications-"

"I don't have the time right now Dumpster!" Ever since Dumpster Dog had gotten used to speaking, he started saying random things in pompous accents.

"Why, good master, I disagree that you lack the time for a…" he stopped talking when Naruto ran off through the crowd, either running to or running from.

Dumpster Dog followed his master's sent trail and found that, luckily for Naurto because he would have sunken his teeth into his shitty old ankle and…

Naruto had found Kushina, in the dark corner of a musty, crowded tea shop. Dumpster pushed his way under the table, knocking it and scattering a few china cups in the process. He lied down at Naruto's feet very stealthy like, well, he thought he was stealthy like.

And Naruto did not have the heart to shatter that strange delusion of the dogs.

Kushina's eyebrow was twitching as the dog stood on her foot and snuggled himself under the table like an elephant. She looked across to Naruto, taking in his waving hand and exaggerated look as that she should just ignore the dog.

He had changed since that encounter in the tunnel several weeks before, a forest green shirt, a sharp jacket and black slacks. Had he found some sort of work or something, looking so professional like that?

After there had been no reports of mass destruction over the last few weeks since he'd escaped, she had come to admit that maybe he was a decent sort of fellow.

Besides, he was an Uzumaki, they are all inheritably awesome.

It had been a surprise, so much so that she had jumped, her tea splashing up and plodding back in her cup. She just wasn't expecting a near missile to come barrelling at her from amongst the midday crowd.

She tightened her bandaged hand around her cup. And then tightened even further when she remembered why it was bandaged.

You failed, you were the leader of the mission and you failed! You let a war changing weapon escape- you let an unstoppable force of nature escape! Who does that? Who? You! You, you fool! War protocol says that I need to take off one of your fingers for failure to succeed, but I think three is much more realistic!

He's jabbering and waving his arms about like an exited child…Grass was never this big back in my world, it's amazing, so much music and dancers!...

"Yes, well" She cuts into his breaking-the-sound-barrier talk with a cough. "It's because Grass remains unaffected by the war, nearly three times the original population has migrated here. They are all refuges…"

He nods sagely across the table. Ha, image that- this Kyuubi sympathiser- a sage!

"You know when I became a sage I- AHHAH!" She spat her tea out in a glorious spit take, not quite believing the coincidence of the situation. Could he read minds? Did he have those sorts of godly powers?

She expected him to get angry at being covered in tea, but instead he started laughing like someone had just smiled upon him.

"That was so funny! Don't you believe me?" She looked down into her cup, a little embarrassed because he looked so much like Minato for a while there, and the sight of Minato always made her embarrassed. Stupid Minato.

"Well, I didn't really, but," she looked up and meet his gaze with a challenge. " What summon then?"

"Toad"

"Whad'eya? Fight as sage yet?"

"Yeah."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah. It was an intense fight-"

"Oh, I don't think a kid like you understands the meaning of 'intense fight' quite yet."

Naruto's fine with her thinking that he's a new kid on the block. It's nice to be mothered like this.

There's a pause.

"You know, the toads were the ones who started the whole ball rolling." Naruto squirts an eye in question. "Apparently there was this prophesy made that the one to bring peace to our world would be you and-"Naruto raises his hands to shush her.

"Yeah, makes sense." He lowers his hands and jams them in his coat pockets, reclining all the way back in his seat and staring at the ceiling. "In my world there was a prophesy about me that went along the same lines as well." He huffs in annoyance. "And since I don't exist here, the summons must have needed me to come from my realm, makes sense when you think." She eyes him suspiciously as he talks. Sounds like a big ego to her…

"Is there a war going on where you come from?"

"No."

Pause. She thinks over what he had said before.

"How do you know you don't exits-"and again he cuts her off mid-sentence!

"I should have been born three years ago, but I ain't."

"Oh yeah? What if you've been put into hiding or-"

"Have you had any children yet, Miss. Uzumaki?" She flusters and turns red, she's thought about having children plenty of times but they're not in a relationship serious enough for that- oh, hell, they aren't even in a relationship any more!

"No! What are you… imply…ing.." It hits her like a sledge hammer, no, a bit more violent; a landslide, perhaps?

"What! This isn't funny! Don't think I'm falling for it for one second you-" He jumps up, the dog instinctively following suit which leads to an overturned table and cracked china all over the floor. He's walking backwards through the startled crowd and waves at her like it's the biggest joke in the world.

"See you later mooooomm." He draws it out for comic effect and she feels her hair fly up in response to her rage.

"You come back here so I can twist your ear in half you dirty great..." He's off cackling in the distance and she can't help but notice that her heart is skipping beats all over the place. Because did you see who he looks like…oh, god…

No. Kushina is a veteran war shinobi. She is a mature, strong women.

She does _not_ melt like a school girl whenever a certain STUFF-YOU-MINATO! Is mentioned or seen.

Perhaps.

Maybe.

Possibly.

Did you see how cute their kid turns out she jus-

SHUT UP!

* * *

"Bee!" Naruto traps the thick man in a headlock before he can reach any of his swords. The blonde is being obnoxious on purpose this time. He's been sitting in the trees for a while now, thinking about how to best approach the man who was creating raps, oblivious to his watcher, below.

It's best to be direct and truthful in this situation, Naruto thinks to himself.

"Wha! What the hell dude!" Naruto jumps out of harm's way quickly, back beside Dumpster Dog who has just ambled his way out of the dabbled shade.

"I'm a good friend of yours in another world, got to trust me on this, okay!" It's not a question, and Killer Bee notices that. What, does this scrimp think he's doing ordering him around!

When he goes to reach his swords, the blonde tilts his head so its shadowed his face juuuusst right. What does this scrimp think he's doing, threatening him?!

And then the scrimp is in front of him and he only just has time to dodge a hand. He is paranoid that the blonde could sneak up on him so well. Missing ninjas live in paranoia, he should have noticed someone approaching, for sure.

"Wanna fight?" The kid asks, starting to smirk and set himself into an alert stance. "No killing though old man."

Bee raises one of his swords in front of his face. "No where's the fun in that?"

By the end of it, they have dug a new valley into the landscape, introduced six new lakes and demolished _a lot_ of trees.

They are both thoroughly calm with one another's presence now, because the best way to judge someone is to fight them, you know, know, know~!

They get talking, sitting cross legged like school children in the green grass, Dumpster is spread out beside them and the two are laughing and swapping stories at a million miles an hour. They are cut and bruised, bleeding in steady trickles and turning purple-grey. But that doesn't matter, because this here, dis' my new friend! He's names Naruto so you better remember'o, oh, oh, oh~!

"So Bee, it just so happens that I was on my way to Lightning Country."

"Ah, Naruto little buddy, I used to live there, it's not a great place to holiday in right now."

"Yeah, I know, I've been reading the newspapers. But I'm going to break somebody out."

"Oh, ~ your strong, you can take it on,~ …what you going to do?"

"Bust the Hokage out."

"What?! That dudes guarded by the maddest, the worst, my insane bro! _You_ insane bro!"

"Hey I know, but you see, for me to get back home, I need to explain to this Hokage that some technicalities have been left out of the operation." Naruto slaps his knee to emphasise his point.

"I don't know, it's crazy to try and take on that place, I, I-"

"Come on," Naruto held out his hand to Bee, "you in?" Bee feels that blood, demon side of him perk up at the idea.

And slowly, worryingly bright smile was paired with a worryingly wild smile as they made a partnership.

Breaking the Hokage out of the tightest war prison ever. All on their two lonesome.

Three if you count the dog, which Naruto keeps reminding him off.

Naruto's hoping really bad that Killer Bee will inherit his will, so that he doesn't need to hang around and settle this realms peace problem and well.

Because that, well…that would be a drag.

* * *

Kushina picks up the paper, which are becoming more and scarce these days. She takes one look at the front page and nearly dies. There is Naruto, next to the missing in action eight tails. Waving at cameras. And there is the headline.

_HOKAGE BUST OUT ON THE CARDS APPARENTLY_

_Uzumaki Naruto, a no name we could find nothing about, and Killer Bee, the eight tailed best container and disgraced brother to the current Raikage, have announced to the world that by this afternoon they will have rescued the Third Hokage, Sarutobi Hizen, from his heavily guarded jail cell in Lightning Country. Many attempts like this have been made, but none have been announced to the press beforehand. When asked if this was a joke, Uzumaki said "Nope. I totally am going to smash in there and grab the old man, I have an important issue to discuss with him that can't wait, so that's why I'm launching this rescue mission with my buddy Bee here." When asked how long the two had known each other for, they said they had only met yesterday._

_One very concerned Kei Izuuka reporting_

She reaches the end and lunges out of the reception area window. She is so inexplicably worried, he's from another world with no war, he had said so, he doesn't know how dangerous this is! Her heart is in her throat as she flies to the konaha base. She can't help it, she likes the kid and, and, well, damn he's her son! She has no trouble believing that, with the way he talks and laughs, just like her father and brothers, so _damn_ alike.

Its midday when she gets there, having ran at full ninja speed, she has never been thankful for unlimited chakra reserves before. She rushes in through the concealed door; the guards letting her through without hassle- everyone knows that a streak of red can only mean Kushina.

It's haywire inside; everyone has crowded into the small cellar and is going crazy. Everyone's talking as she tries to push her way through the shuffling bodies. It seems they are in a middle of a meeting about the article. Just her luck.

She's half way up to the front where someone is addressing the loud crowd from where they stand on a cart.

"He is essential to our peace, we cannot let him die!"

"We need to retrieve the demon now that he has revealed where he!"

"Raise your hand in favour of sending out a retrieval party!"

The entire tent shoot their hand up.

"Arh, well okay then… four?"

"Sounds good!"

"Five!"

"You only need me!" The crowd laughs at the attempted joke; they are all desperate to lessen the seriousness of the situation. The speaker spots her red head amongst the crowd.

"Uzumaki!" There is a collective groan from the crowd. "You've meet him before, you know what he looks like, you're on the team!" Everyone is up about the discussion, arguing about the good points and the bad, some for her and against, she thinks punches have started to be thrown a few bodies behind her. She decides to settle this the best way she knows how. Head on.

So she jumps up on the crate, knocking the speaker of with a swing of her hips, taking her time to fix her hair while people slowly come to a quiet. Someone wolf whistles at her.

"Thank you, Asuma," she says seriously, which everyone bursts into laughter at…because it's an over done joke that Asuma has the hots for Kushina, even though he swears he doesn't and probably wasn't even the one to whistle just then. In fact, he should be out on an assassination mission in Rice country right now. She stands and glares everyone down. Glares her battle scared family down in mock disgust. Everyone is laughing on the inside, after all this, they will sit down on the ground, all grimy and scoop watery rice into their mouths, heads huddled in conversation amongst each other.

"What's so bad about me? Tell me how you really feel, come on!" And so they start to precariously offer up their reasons and she shoots them down one by one.

"You lost him once already!"

"Take a look at her hand!"

"You're clumsy!"

"We don't want to lose you."

"Your too good to die yet Kushina!"

She looks up and searches the back of the crowd for any more suicidal hands, and meets a pair of laughing blue eyes.

They are fixated on her.

They do not look away.

Why didn't they tell her he was here? What sort of traitorous scrum does she live with these days?

She ducks her head as her face turns read and jumps off the crate like a bolt, seaming back into the crowd, liking the anonymous feeling for once. She and Minato had only really met three times after the war had started, and those times were more like just seeing. Out of the corner of the eye. In the distance. Yeah.

The stupid war, it stopped everything in its tracks. He had just saved her, she had just fallen in love, they were just starting to work up the courage to ask each other on dates. Damn, damn, damn, damn.

And she knew exactly what was going to happen, now that they had the smartest for the situation, they needed the strongest…

"Minato! You go to!" That was met by a whole house cheer.

There was no way she was getting out of this; she had made sure herself, just minutes ago, by killing all reasons to why she could, should, whatever not.

Damn, damn, damn, damn, _damn._


	6. Allowed

Kakashi scrambled his way onto the stage.

"The person we summoned, he can't access the Kyuubi, he said so when we meet."

"Really?" Kushina started along with everyone else in the crowded, underground hideout.

In that moment, the leader made a split second decision.

"Kushina, Minato, Kakashi, Anko! Go, go, go!" As the four awkwardly pushed their way through the crowd, not sure where they were meant to go exactly, the leader carried on. "God's speed my friends! Bring back the foolish saviour of our universe! _God's speed!"_

Anko looked at Minato, puzzled, why was she on the team? She was only a chunin. Minato chucked nervously.

"I suppose we'd better get going than?"

Damn right, through Kushina, crossing her arms and looking smug for no reason in particular. She was just desperately trying to override her nerves.

* * *

He wasn't entirely sure the team choice was the best that could have been. Why, if he was given the chance to choice, he would have pushed Kushina right out of the mixture altogether. She could get hurt, or die or, or...get hurt. Kakashi…fine, so Kakashi was a good choice.

And then there is Anko, residential poison extraordinaire, what was she going to do, exactly? She didn't even have a summoning contract to rely on.

It was one o'clock when his team finally arrived within seeing distance of the base, and what they saw was not the strongest fortress in over three eras, no, it was just billowing towers of smoke.

And the odd flash of blue and purple every now and again.

The closer they got, the less the constant, nervous chit chat of the members behind them slowed down. It was party time.

Minato smirked. He loved party time.

The team hung close to his side as they ran blindly through the smoke, sometimes having to jump over fallen bodies. He pulled his special kunai out ready and signal for his team to do the same. Load your firearms, grab your weapons and get ready to snatch and grab in the most dangerous situation in nine decades- at _least_.

Ah! There he was! Right in front! Minato was two steps into an awesome manoeuvre which would have had the highly dangerous demon in seal, when, all of a sudden black chains lashed up from the floor and enveloped the extra-terrestrial.

The he popped.

Ah, clone…

Eventually, after a lightning ninja whose left arm had been blown off, nine charka depleted soldiers and a random, thrashing limb of the eight tails, they found the original.

Granted, it wasn't that hard, you just had to follow the sweet sounds of destruction.

"Come on Old Man! Let me go already!" The extra-terrestrial was shaking their Hokage back and forth, seeming to have stooped to violence when words had failed. "I don't belong here! The meaning of the prophesy got lost in translation! Hell, only 0.8% of prophecies actually come true! Stop living in the past! Get modern! Let me go! I HAVE A LIFE TO GET BACK TO YOUR KNOW! BELIEVE IT!"

"Okay, okay" Wheezed their feared-across-the-nations Hokage, trying to hold his hands up and signify his surrender.

"Just get me some aspirin and I'll let you go." The Hokage hid his face in his shoulder when he saw the look of thunder that crossed the extra-terrestrials face.

"No! No aspirin Old Man, you are inefficient when medicated, that's why you were so shitty in your last years of Hokagehood!" The young blonde jabbed his finger at the man's chest with each word.

"What? Wha- well, whatever! Go! It's not like I was the one who summoned you anyway! I didn't even know- I was in jail! Thank you very much!" The Hokage flew his arms into the air, huffing in defiance.

And with that, the dog barked and the teenager (for he could see that now) whooped in celebration before instantly disappearing with a snap back to wherever they had come from.

"What…just happened there, exactly?"

"More than you could possibly imagine," Kushina said from where she was at his side.

* * *

"Okay Dumpster, no more, correct?" The dog's head nodded so fast it nearly blurred. "Okay than." Naruto took a breath of relief and opened the shower cubical door. "Now onwards, my new talking companion! To the buffet in tent kitchen 7!" Dumpster barked happily in agreement.

The man in the line, blanched. He was _not_ going in _that_ shower room if the nation's hero had gone in and come out _covered_ in _blood_.

Just what the hell was he doing in there anyway?

More than you could possibly imagine.


	7. Taut

Naruto was half way through swallowing a mouthful of half cooked rice when it hit him. Hit him hard, right across the face, even. He was standing when he should have been sitting; he was looking at a steel fire escape when he should have been watching is bowl of gluggy rice. Through a jacket that he certainly had not been wearing before, he felt the way his back was pressed up against a harsh brick wall.

There was a fuming girl, her hand flung to the side as if she had just slapped him…oh…that was why the whole side of his face stung.

"This is the last time Naruto! You're good for nothing and I've had it up to here," her manicured nails sliced dangerously at the top of her high bun. "You're lazy, you're selfish, you don't think about anyone else but yourself and _I hate you_."

Naruto was trying to piece it all together, he was- he really was. Until he had a plan through, Naruto did what he did best.

Improvise.

"The hell?" He shouted back, pushing himself of the moss covered bricks. The girl swirled on him,

"Don't act all shocked, you know exactly what you did!" She jabbed his chest, looking beastly. Naruto had dealt with bests before; he had dealt with beasts beyond beliefs. He was confident he could deal with this raging girl.

"Oh yeah? What did I do, what did I really do that is this bad?" Naruto flung his hands up, noticing the many night club bracelets that dangled from his wrists. Had he just been out on a pub crawl? Should he be acting more drunk? Naruto frowned; if he had been on a bender, than shouldn't he have stamps along his arms as well?

"Sleeping around, Naruto, you didn't seriously think that I didn't know what you've been doing? You've got a lovely little harem throughout the village, don't you? Don't you!" She was really getting aggressive now; Naruto winced as she left red, swelling scratches along his arms and around his neck where she had lashed out at him. Naruto did not take kindly.

"Oh yeah? Well you knew what you were getting yourself into when we started this. You shouldn't be hitting me! What if I were to do that to you?" As a conclusion he pushed her away, sending her reeling backwards on her devil sharp heels.

"Grown up Naruto!" she screamed at him, her blonde hair covering half her face as she spun on him. "Drag your _useless_ head out of your _spoilt_ asshole and _grown up_! Get a job, get a life! Get a check-up; I can only imagine all the disease you probably picked up from all your _sluts_!"

"Really? This is how we handle these types of situations these days? I for one am-"

That was when he finally saw Dumpster Dog. Further down the steaming alleyway…in a puddle of his own blood. Naruto dropped his attempts at weeding information out of the furious girl, something like that could really, _really_ wait for a bit. Naruto sprinting over to the dog, side stepping when garbage bins got too close together and jumping over billowing vents that were hissing stream from their place in the pavement. Naruto crouching down by the dog's side, taking in the way Dumpster was curled and shivering, trying to look for any signs of what it could be that was causing the growing puddle. Naruto started to shake Dumpster, rolling him over and looking for any type of wound.

There was nothing. It was all coming from his mouth, slowly seeping as the dog squirmed before spewing another gutful of gore from his throat.

Naruto cursed dirtier than he had ever cursed in his lifetime. The fine hairs along his neck rose as he sensed the girl from before shuffle and start to move cautiously over to him.

"What's with the dog?" She asked in a bored tone, grating on every one of Naruto's nerves. Naruto stretched his chakra out, searching for someone who had the taint of a medic-nin on their signature. He picked Dumpster up, thick black clots of blood running over his clothes.

"Eww…" the girl hissed from behind him, her anger forgotten for disgust. "You're not seriously carrying that thing, are you?" Naruto turned back and watched her face carefully, wondering what he should do if what he had just sensed proved real and not just a hallucination.

"Who am I?" He asked her, searching for straws

"You're my now _ex_- boyfriend." She said snaily, her alcohol stained teeth barred at him.

"Why are there so many people after me?" He asked, hoping- praying- that she knew what he meant. She looked at him in growing shock.

"You forgot to suppress your signature?" She rippled up to him, grabbing the front of his jacket in her claws, "Did you give yourself away? Naruto you fucking stuff up! How can you just forget about staying hidden?" She shoved him away, yanked her sequenced cardigan around before taking off down the alley way as fast as her heels would take her. She paused and looked back at him before she turned the corner, enough time to hatefully stick her middle finger up at him. With that final message she stalked into the labyrinth of alleys and backstreets. What was he to do now? What was he _going to do_?

Naruto held Dumpster tighter to his chest, knowing at once that he needed to go nowhere because they were all coming to him. All of them, it had felt like a swarm when he had first picked up on them. A few of them even had the taint of medicine to them, so he prayed. Prayed that they were the good guys.

These weren't his clothes, but Naruto had caught enough glances of familiar scars to know that it was his own body, which explained the lack of stamps. He was in his own body. His own sore muscles tensed as the skilled signatures he had felt closed in on him by the dozen. At least with his own trained body, he had the opinion of fighting his way out. Could he tap into sage mode? The natural order of this place felt foreign.

Dumpster lolled lifelessly as Naruto waited for the masked men to make the first move. Fear started to sprinkle into his system. Where was he? He needed Dumpster to take him back home, he needed Dumpster to live. He needed Dumpster to explain why this was happing, why…why? Naruto searched Dumpster's blood cracked face for answers that he knew were never going to be there.

He had through that this was all over.


	8. Tort

They did nothing. He had to beat them all down and order the medic tainted one at knife point. Honestly, what type of people existed in this next world? And you know what the medic guy did? He had the vile notion to _give up_. Naruto watched the man's green healing charka flicker away, his eyes narrowed and he slide the knife he had found in his pocket closer to the masked man's neck.

"Fix him, now!" Naruto growled, the medical man only stuttered and swallowed.

"But, but… there's no wound." Naruto watched the man's Adam's apple bob up and down. He really felt like _messing_ someone's _face_ up right now.

"There's blood coming out of his mouth." Naruto hissed, shoving the man back down onto the ground next to Dumpster dog who was bleeding and coughing and…bleeding. "Heal him!" The pain of losing Dumpster as well as the confusion and terror of being back in an unfamiliar realm was making Naruto's judgement black out.

"There's nothing there to heal." The man squealed, but he went to double check Dumpster's swollen body anyway.

Naruto looked around at all the others, nursing their wounds and eyeing him wearingly from where he stood, not a hair out of place. One brave masked man asked him a question,

"When the hell did you get so strong?" Naruto cocked his head to the side, the noting of information gathering just occurring to him. The masked man was watching Naruto from across the alley way, the next he was being knocked up against a brick wall, the rapidly unfamiliar boy glaring into his mask's eye holes.

"What's your name?" Naruto asked, the knife switching to a different neck this time.

"Pan," he said quickly. "For all the world, we're only a bunch of chunin, take it easy! We just happened to be sweeping over the area when we sensed your chakra flare up." He tried to squirm out of Naruto's grasp, the blond let him stumble out of his reach.

"But you guys felt…" Naruto squinted at him in confusion, "strong."

"That's an intimidation technique," one masked man whispered, cradling his bleeding arm. Naruto knew he would be fine; he had made sure to not lethally hurt any of them.

"Am I wanted or something?" Naruto asked, starting to pace around and watch the medic nin working on Dumpster.

"Is this a joke?" The brave one asked, some others snorted in agreement. Naruto snapped his head around, flickering over in front of the speaker.

"This is no fucking joke," Naruto pretty much snarled. "I aint your Naruto, I'm an alternative who's gotten thrown into-" Naruto looked down at what he was wearing, leather and studs, a fashion that Naruto's village had seen little of, "- these kinky clothes." He finished off with a bemused pitch in his voice.

There was a minute of uncomfortable silence as Naruto sat on an upturned crate and tried to push back the rising wave of panic he was feeling. One of the masked men shuffled, coughed, and offered a gruff sort of apology.

"Is okay," Naruto slurred through his hands.

"It's just that… everyone says you never even managed to graduate the academy, so we just assumed you were an easy- stealthy- but an easy guy to bring in." Several of the others nodded their heads or mumbled their own 'yeah, sorry man' to him.

"Maybe in this world," Naruto admitted, "but in mine, I've fought alongside Kages."

And that was the moment the conversation stopped; because someone new had just jumped down into the alleyway.


	9. Taught

"All I heard was 'I've fought alongside kages' and let me tell you something kid-" Jariya made a show of crouching next to Naruto from where he sat on the crate. "That's the biggest load of bullshit I have ever heard."

Naruto just gawked at Jariya's short hair, long white beard and dangly, sacrificial priest like earrings. All in all, he looked very different and much more…blessed then the version Naruto had known. Version, it was like they were toasters or something, the latest model off the production line.

There was a strong presence of contempt that rolled off Jariya. If Naruto had been through nothing less than a world war since the man had died then he might have been stung by that.

But he wasn't, and with one eye still on Dumpster Dog, Naruto squared his teenage shoulders firmly.

And so began the stare off to end all others.

Some way in, one of the masked men sneezed. Dumpster gave an especially violent heave. A crow flew over the alleyway nosily. A firework went off a block away. The wind picked up and made a howling noise through the alley. A roaming cat knocked an empty wine bottle over and scared itself. Naruto developed an itch in his eyebrow.

Jariya glanced at his watch and looked at Naruto with a cool expression.

"You lasted about five months this time, Goth." Jariya said as he straightened up, his back and knees popping.

"I'm not a Goth," Naruto deadpanned. His favourite colour was orange, as a matter of fact.

"You're not?" Jariya asked, drawing out his words in a whine before becoming serious. "Whatever. You forgot to cover your signature, which shines like a beacon, a squad swoops in, immobilises you, I come, lecture, take your insults, repeat, than I take you home to mommy and daddy." Jariya pauses, an evil grin leaking across his face. "Then it's their turn to lecture."

Naruto gulped.

Jariya crackled.

Dumpster Dog chose that moment to wheeze and wake up.

Naruto quickly forgot Jariya and flickered over to the dog, hovering over his head.

"Explain Dumpster, explain Dumpster, explain Dumpster." Naruto chanted, trying to get the dog's attention before he drifted off again. Dumpster weakly bit one of Naruto's arms that were waving in front of his face.

"Ow!" Naruto whined, sticking his lip out and rubbing his arm.

"Time lord wants to talk to time minion so dragging minion to the realm he's in through power of time." Dumpster rushed through his bloody lips in his best explanation. He had to dumb it down enough for Naruto to understand quickly, but even then Naruto frowned and scratched his head in confusion.

"Why am I coming too? Why are you hurt?"

"Because our systems are entwined, remember? You're being dragged after me…by the delicate ends of my intestines." Dumpster said it all with closed eyes as he continued to pant. Naruto filter through the information.

"Yes, but, why are you hurt?"

Dumpster chose to just dog-growl at Naruto before repeating in a low voice

"Dragging _you_ by the _ends_ of my spiritual _intestines_!"

Someone sniggered behind them.

Jariya was frowning, time lord? Time minion? Realms? But even that wasn't what made him know something was definitely going on. No, it was that Naruto was being concerned for another. Naruto! Concerned! Something is not just going on, something is going wrong.

And it is _ugly_.

The dog threw up again. But instead of stopping it continued like a twisted version of a tap. Jariya watched in horror as the animal's skin started to shrink, his ribs becoming clear as they pressed against the animal's blood slicked fur. Its spew stopped being bloody chunks and morphed into what looked like a whole, black ocean. It was like watching a horror movie which was at the climactic moment of terror; the demon was evolving, the ghost was taking over, the sidekick was dying.

Like that, the dog disappeared, yet the boy stayed.

"Naruto?" Jariya asked cautiously, looking around and noticing that the masked men had fled. The black haired boy groaned and peeked up at him. Why he insisted to dye it that colour, he would never know. Hence the Goth tease.

"I lasted six months this time," the boy said cockily. Jariya grinned, relieved to have Naruto back to normal. "Expect it doubled next time, old man."

"Doubled? I don't think so."

Jariya slung Naruto's arm over his shoulder, supporting him out of the alleyway.

"Sur' just a noisy man who runs a bathhouse and sucks up to my parents too much, how are you going to be able to capture all _this_?" The boy gestured to himself in grand affair.

"The same way I caught you all the other times, you pathetic shinobi dropout." Naruto chuckled at Jariya's words, then groaned when he thought ahead to the overly parental lectures that were lined up in his foreseeable future.

"They are going to eat you alive." Jariya informed the boy with sick glee. The boy moaned,

"They wouldn't do that…not to their own flesh and blood at least."

Jariya hummed as he thought. The boy had no idea that he was adopted and Jariya liked to keep it that way. He wondered what he would have been doing with his life at this moment, if he had not been called back to the village by the old Hokage.

If only Naruto had passed that exam, then he wouldn't have been dragged back by his ear, told to pose as an ordinary citizen and look out for the boy like some morbid guardian angel. He had been instructed to train him up, but the kid had pretty much set his heart on becoming a "radio host" or "DJ" or whatever. So became the woe of these games, training disguised as something shiny so that Naruto was willing to do so.

He had to admit the kid was getting good, six months was a long time to successfully hide from a sage, let alone Jariya the toad sage, the sexiest man and greatest spy master to have ever lived.

"Oi, old man! How come I can't remember anything? Did you knock me out? Why can't I feel my toes? Are we stopping for ramen? Old man! Old man! Oi, you ugly grey man!" Naruto heaved a sigh and tried again.

"Oi, you there, the one that looks like an idiot."

Jariya turned to Naruto, ready to death stare the kid into the past century.

"Ha!" Naruto shouted gleefully in Jariya's face. "You looked! You looked!"

Jariya was so, so, so, _so_ glad he managed to weasel the right to start a bathhouse out of this (to "make his cover seem more realist") otherwise he would have gone insane by now.

Why did the prophesied child have to be such a…a…teenager? Of all the human beings, why?


End file.
